ENGL 645 Nineteenth-Century American Literature & Culture | Gregory Eiselein | Spring 2008
Paper #2: Comparative Analysis of Whitman and the Transcendentalists
Basic Assignment. Choose a text authored by a Transcendentalist writer
(from Myerson's Transcendentalism: A Reader) and a poem by Walt
Whitman (from Leaves of Grass) and write a four-to-five page paper that
compares the two works.
Examples and Advice. You might compare two texts that take different
approaches to the same idea, theme, issue, or phenomenon (such as death,
sexuality, gender, race, nature, virtue, society, the self, good, evil, religion,
God, etc., etc.). Or you might compare the similarity of aims in texts that
seem to be very different in terms of style or genre. Or you could compare
literary techniques or political aims. You might compare the methods or aims of writers who
seem to have similar styles or similar topics and themes but nonetheless have subtle but
important differences that distinguish their ideas. Or you could compare forms of argument or
types of advice they offer. You could compare two texts by detailing an important relationship
between them, a relationship such as influence or conflict.
In short, there are many different ways to approach a comparative analysis, though I think it is
key to figure out what your grounds for comparison are (why did you pick these two texts rather
than some other texts?) and your reasons for comparing (why bother? or what is interesting,
significant, or productive about comparing these two texts? what do we learn about these texts—
that we might not realize by just reading them separately—when we compare them to each
other?).
For more specific advice, I have attached to
this sheet Kerry Walk's handout on "How to
Write a Comparative Analysis." For most of
you, this may be review. On the other hand,
if you've never written a paper like this, you
will find her advice indispensable.
Reminders. The paper should have a good
title. It should be typed and double-spaced.
Please use MLA style to cite texts and
provide information on your sources.
Due Date. Thursday, March 6th.
Length. 4-5 pages.
Portraits: Walt Whitman (top) and Ralph Waldo
Emerson (bottom)
How to Write a Comparative Analysis
Throughout your academic career, you'll be asked to write papers in which you compare and contrast two
things: two texts, two theories, two historical figures, two scientific processes, and so on. "Classic"
compare-and-contrast papers, in which you weight A and B equally, may be about two similar things that
have crucial differences (two pesticides with different effects on the environment) or two similar things
that have crucial differences, yet turn out to have surprising commonalities (two politicians with vastly
different world views who voice unexpectedly similar perspectives on sexual harassment).
In the "lens" (or "keyhole") comparison, in which you weight A less heavily than B, you use A as a lens
through which to view B. Just as looking through a pair of glasses changes the way you see an object,
using A as a framework for understanding B changes the way you see B. Lens comparisons are useful for
illuminating, critiquing, or challenging the stability of a thing that, before the analysis, seemed perfectly
understood. Often, lens comparisons take time into account: earlier texts, events, or historical figures may
illuminate later ones, and vice versa.
Faced with a daunting list of seemingly unrelated similarities and differences, you may feel confused
about how to construct a paper that isn't just a mechanical exercise in which you first state all the features
that A and B have in common, and then state all the ways in which A and B are different. Predictably, the
thesis of such a paper is usually an assertion that A and B are very similar yet not so similar after all. To
write a good compare-and-contrast paper, you must take your raw data—the similarities and differences
you've observed—and make them cohere into a meaningful argument. Here are the five elements
required.
Frame of Reference. This is the context within which you place the two things you plan to compare and
contrast; it is the umbrella under which you have grouped them. The frame of reference may consist of an
idea, theme, question, problem, or theory; a group of similar things from which you extract two for
special attention; biographical or historical information. The best frames of reference are constructed from
specific sources rather than your own thoughts or observations. Thus, in a paper comparing how two
writers redefine social norms of masculinity, you would be better off quoting a sociologist on the topic of
masculinity than spinning out potentially banal-sounding theories of your own. Most assignments tell you
exactly what the frame of reference should be, and most courses supply sources for constructing it. If you
encounter an assignment that fails to provide a frame of reference, you must come up with one on your
own. A paper without such a context would have no angle on the material, no focus or frame for the writer
to propose a meaningful argument.
Grounds for Comparison. Let's say you're writing a paper on global food distribution, and you've
chosen to compare apples and oranges. Why these particular fruits? Why not pears and bananas? The
rationale behind your choice, the grounds for comparison, lets your reader know why your choice is
deliberate and meaningful, not random. For instance, in a paper asking how the "discourse of domesticity"
has been used in the abortion debate, the grounds for comparison are obvious; the issue has two
conflicting sides, pro-choice and pro-life. In a paper comparing the effects of acid rain on two forest sites,
your choice of sites is less obvious. A paper focusing on similarly aged forest stands in Maine and the
Catskills will be set up differently from one comparing a new forest stand in the White Mountains with an
old forest in the same region. You need to indicate the reasoning behind your choice.
Thesis. The grounds for comparison anticipates the comparative nature of your thesis. As in any
argumentative paper, your thesis statement will convey the gist of your argument, which necessarily
follows from your frame of reference. But in a compare-and-contrast, the thesis depends on how the two
things you've chosen to compare actually relate to one another. Do they extend, corroborate, complicate,
contradict, correct, or debate one another? In the most common compare-and-contrast paper—one
2
focusing on differences—you can indicate the precise relationship between A and B by using the word
"whereas" in your thesis:
Whereas Camus perceives ideology as secondary to the need to address a specific historical
moment of colonialism, Fanon perceives a revolutionary ideology as the impetus to reshape
Algeria's history in a direction toward independence.
Whether your paper focuses primarily on difference or similarity, you need to make the relationship
between A and B clear in your thesis. This relationship is at the heart of any compare-and-contrast paper.
Organizational Scheme. Your introduction will include your frame of reference, grounds for
comparison, and thesis. There are two basic ways to organize the body of your paper.
•
In text-by-text, you discuss all of A, then all of B.
•
In point-by-point, you alternate points about A with comparable points about B.
If you think that B extends A, you'll probably use a text-by-text scheme; if you see A and B engaged in
debate, a point-by-point scheme will draw attention to the conflict. Be aware, however, that the point-bypoint scheme can come off as a ping-pong game. You can avoid this effect by grouping more than one
point together, thereby cutting down on the number of times you alternate from A to B. But no matter
which organizational scheme you choose, you need not give equal time to similarities and differences. In
fact, your paper will be more interesting if you get to the heart of your argument as quickly as possible.
Thus, a paper on two evolutionary theorists' different interpretations of specific archaeological findings
might have as few as two or three sentences in the introduction on similarities and at most a paragraph or
two to set up the contrast between the theorists' positions. The rest of the paper, whether organized textby-text or point-by-point, will treat the two theorists' differences.
You can organize a classic compare-and-contrast paper either text-by-text or point-by-point. But in a
"lens" comparison, in which you spend significantly less time on A (the lens) than on B (the focal text),
you almost always organize text-by-text. That's because A and B are not strictly comparable: A is merely
a tool for helping you discover whether or not B's nature is actually what expectations have led you to
believe it is.
Linking of A and B. All argumentative papers require you to link each point in the argument back to the
thesis. Without such links, your reader will be unable to see how new sections logically and
systematically advance your argument. In a compare-and contrast, you also need to make links between A
and B in the body of your essay if you want your paper to hold together. To make these links, use
transitional expressions of comparison and contrast (similarly, moreover, likewise, on the contrary,
conversely, on the other hand) and contrastive vocabulary (in the example below,
Southerner/Northerner).
As a girl raised in the faded glory of the Old South, amid mystical tales of magnolias and
moonlight, the mother remains part of a dying generation. Surrounded by hard times, racial
conflict, and limited opportunities, Julian, on the other hand, feels repelled by the provincial
nature of home, and represents a new Southerner, one who sees his native land through a
condescending Northerner's eyes.
Copyright 1998, Kerry Walk, for the Writing Center at Harvard University
3